


like meteors

by pepperfield



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Canonical Character Death, Gen, Last Words AU, Self-Acceptance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-27
Updated: 2017-01-27
Packaged: 2018-09-20 08:01:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,250
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9481985
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pepperfield/pseuds/pepperfield
Summary: Last words, last rites, and what it means to die for the rebellion.[AU in which the last words you hear before dying are written on your wrist]





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is honestly such a slipshod AU (directly ripping off a soulmark trope), but I foolishly hashed it out anyway, so hopefully some of you will enjoy it. Please let me know if you have any questions/concerns! Thank you for reading.

_Standby, Rogue One, we're on it._

Bodhi’s kept his last words hidden ever since his first day of training as an Imperial pilot. He’s sure they’re in his personnel file, but that doesn’t mean he wants some random stormtrooper or cargo inspector to see his mark. So, like many others, he wears a thin cloth band over the gold letters, and keeps his sleeves long just in case.

Besides, “Rogue One”? He’s long assumed it’s a code name or callsign of some sort, and definitely not the Imperial kind. There’s no way that doesn’t spell trouble. But there’s no one around to ask about the name, no way to research without drawing attention to himself, so Bodhi lets it go. Last words are last words – no use landing himself in hot water over the inevitable. All he has to do is keep his head down and fly straight.

Which he does. He does it well, even as it begins to erode at his soul and drain his spirit. He does it so well that no one notices that the only thing he wants is to drift beyond the stars, into the infinite dark, out of the Empire’s reach. And he does it so well that no one questions him when one of the head weapons engineers requests his assistance; no one questions his departure until he’s already escaped into hyperspace.

He can’t help but remember his mark in fleeting bursts every time his life is threatened over the next few miserable days. Death is near; he can taste it in the back of his throat, but if anything, it makes his desperate drive to live even stronger. He wants to see his mission through. He wants to deliver Galen’s message, he wants to see the rebellion destroy the weapon, and a little selfishly, he wants to fly again, if the Alliance will have him. It wouldn’t have to be in a fighter: he knows they’re probably wary about taking on a deserter. But it would be nice, he thinks, to see the stars again under a cause he can actually believe in.

His words haunt him, but he continues not to die, so Bodhi doesn’t really _think_ about it until he’s seated next to Chirrut on their journey toward Eadu and he spots the mark trailing up the other man’s arm. He’s surprised first to see any words at all, plainly uncovered for the world to see, and even more surprised when he sees that Chirrut’s words are written in Jedhanese instead of Basic.

Instinctively, he averts his eyes. It’s rude to read someone else’s final mark without asking, and he tries to push the words, writ in silver and elegantly curving upwards like a climbing vine, out of his mind. It helps that his Jedhanese is rusty, but it’s too late, he’s already translated Chirrut’s words without thinking.

_The Force is with me, and I'm one with the Force._

He recognizes the prayer as the inverse of one that he's heard many times from Chirrut himself, and is struck with a hollow sadness at the questions that follow. But he keeps his mouth shut, for a few minutes at least, until Chirrut notices his quiet restlessness.

“Ah. You’ve noticed them?” Chirrut asks, tilting his wrist outward so that Bodhi can get a better look. Without thinking, he looks again, before shying away awkwardly. He fiddles with his goggles for lack of something better to do with his hands. 

“Sorry, I really didn’t mean to-”

Chirrut laughs. “Don’t worry. I keep them uncovered for a reason. Baze!” he calls, nudging his partner, who stops looking out the window and grunts back in response. “What do they say again? Read them to our pilot friend.”

Baze jerks his thumb at Chirrut’s mark. “Like you don’t know what it says.”

“Perhaps I’ve forgotten.”

“You don’t forget anything.”

“Not the important things, no. Like every time you were scolded by the head guardian for never sweeping the cloisters correctly.” Chirrut leans in to whisper conspiratorially to Bodhi, “Or the time he ruined all the rice packets by tying them the wrong way. They completely fell apart. But things like this,” and he waves dismissively at Baze, “I have you to remember them for me.”

Baze rolls his eyes and Chirrut smiles as if he can see the motion.

“Fine. It says ‘Of course you’d die this way, you giant pain in the ass,’” Baze tells Bodhi, who lets slip an involuntary laugh.

“Is that all?” Chirrut asks, frowning at his arm. “I always thought there was a bit more.”

Sharing a dry look with Bodhi, Baze leans over Chirrut’s side and prods at his skin, pretending to examine the silver characters. “Oh. I forgot the ‘good riddance’ at the end.”

“Yes, that’s it,” Chirrut responds brightly, and Bodhi shakes his head, unused to anyone treating their death so lightly.

“You’re really alright with just anyone seeing your last words? I mean, I know not everyone can read Jedhanese, but still, doesn’t it ever feel...intrusive?” Bodhi asks. Under his sleeve, his wrist feels suddenly itchy.

“Baze did say you were from Jedha. You can read this?” Chirrut hums when Bodhi nods, and leans back in his seat. “The Force is with me, and I am one with the Force. And I fear nothing, for all is as the Force wills it to be. Each of us has our chosen time. There is no shame in death, and no shame in the words that precede it, so why cover them?”

“Chirrut forgets - ha! - that others prefer to keep matters like this private,” Baze says. “Do not be pressured by his philosophy.”

Bodhi glances down at his own heavy sleeves. They trail far past his wrist bones, covering almost half of his hands, but he can still clearly picture his mark beneath: stark, crisp Basic in red-tinted gold around his wrist like a jailer’s cuff. No matter how much time passes, the image can't escape him. If anything, the inevitability makes it more harrowing, not less.

“It’s not like I can change anything, but- I guess I thought hiding it would make it less real,” he admits, feeling foolish about his childish logic, but neither man laughs at him.

“No use over-thinking it,” Baze says, nodding as if he agrees. “It will happen when it happens.”

“See,” Chirrut stage-whispers to Bodhi, “He does believe in the Force after all.” Bodhi cracks a smile even as Baze rolls his eyes.

He leaves them when they begin trading playful jibes in Jedhanese, scuttling up to the pilot’s chair to see how their journey is progressing. He passes Jyn along the way, but with her grim expression she doesn’t look up for talking, so he leaves her be, even though he’d like to share a few words with her about her father. There’ll be time for that later, he decides, once Galen has been safely extracted.

Cassian seems on edge when Bodhi approaches him, but he's flying a good course, and doesn't seem to mind his company, so he hovers around up front. He listens to the chatter shared between captain and droid, watching as K-2’s complaints about their new passengers, Bodhi included, brings a flicker of a grin to Cassian’s face. Bodhi’s still too dizzy with his newfound freedom to really take offense, especially since most of K-2’s gripes are centered around Jyn.

Bodhi gets up the nerve to ask Cassian where and how he learned to fly, and they wind up talking about hometowns and terrifying flight instructors and their first times almost crash-landing (Cassian’s story involves clipping a tree and barely avoiding the face of a cliff). For all the hyperfocus that Cassian puts into his mission, he can be personable and engaging, albeit in a reserved way. Conversation flows easily between them, even though Bodhi’s still slightly skittish after his encounter with Saw Gerrera’s men. That is, until Cassian strips off his gloves to massage his sore forearm, and Bodhi notices the bare expanse of skin on Cassian’s arms. His wrists are marked, of course, with scars and scratches, but they aren’t _marked_ , not like they ought to be.

Cassian catches him staring before he can look away, and places his gloves calmly aside, leaving his wrists uncovered. “I didn’t have them removed,” he says, answering a question he’s probably long grown used to receiving. “The words just never developed.”

Bodhi swallows around the lump in his throat. Barely a day of freedom and he’s already encountered two anomalies, two people with a wholly different insight on last words. The universe is more vast and mysterious than he remembered it being. 

“I’ve never met anyone who was unmarked before. I mean, at least I don’t think I have. In the Empire, it’s- well, lots of people cover up, like me. Though, I guess if they’re like you there isn't really anything _to_ cover, but maybe that's the point,” and Bodhi’s babbling, ugh, but Cassian waits him out patiently.

“It is not common, but we do exist. It’s a source of worry for some, but I find it...freeing. As if nothing is written in stone for me.” He looks up briefly at Bodhi, who notices with new clarity the weight Cassian seems to be carrying. As freeing as it might be, Cassian’s personality transforms it into another responsibility. A reason for him to push himself harder, to work with more fervor and strain against his own limits. Bodhi worries at his lip with his teeth, wondering if he should ask any further questions, but Cassian turns to pat K-2SO’s chassis. “Besides, it gives me something in common with K-2,” he says lightly, and if droids could scoff, K-2 would certainly be doing so now.

“Droids cannot die. I thought you were aware of this, but I suppose I have overestimated you yet again,” K-2 says with a great deal more sass than Bodhi’s used to hearing out of a metal voicebox, and he makes an incredulous snort, but Cassian’s half-smile proves that their captain must be fond of K-2’s quirks. The depth of their friendship – and it _is_ a friendship; there's no other word to properly describe it – is unfamiliar to Bodhi for a thousand reasons, but it’s comforting to see, somehow.

Cassian’s laugh is subdued, but his normally tense expression softens for K-2. “Yes, but a droid’s data, its programming...its _personality_ can be lost. And isn't that dying, in its own way? I would so hate to lose you, my friend.”

K-2 remains still, studying Cassian for a beat before twisting around in his chair to face forward. “Thank you, Cassian. It would be a shame to lose you as well.” There’s a sincerity Bodhi can hear that he’s unused to coming from an Imperial droid, but he’s honestly not sure he can be surprised by anything else today.

Shortly after, they enter Eadu’s atmosphere, and from there, none of them get a chance to rest until their return to Yavin 4. Bodhi feels both violently adrift and newly grounded as they fly back. Galen is dead, and Jyn and Cassian are stewing in silence after their confrontation, and yet, despite the tension, Bodhi feels a true sense of purpose for the first time in his life. They need to get the plans for the Death Star: they can’t waste the chance that Galen has given them. As someone who best knows how the Empire works, it’s Bodhi’s duty to help see this through. Once they reach Yavin, he’ll ask the council if he can tag along. Perhaps his experience can be of some use. 

A gnawing ache grows in him whenever his eyes pass over Jyn, huddled by the window next to Baze, tears dried on her cheeks and hands clenched in her lap. He should say something to her. Galen Erso had been Bodhi’s friend, giving him the final push he needed to finally defect, and now he’s dead. He should at least offer Jyn his condolences. But Jyn doesn’t look like she needs platitudes or sympathy. She needs his support, so he steels himself to attend the council meeting by her side when they arrive.

In the seat beside Bodhi, Cassian is still brooding over his fight with Jyn, glaring out into space as Bodhi directs them back to base. Bodhi remains silent, unsure of what to say when Cassian is still stung from Jyn’s unwarranted accusations. They both know she was lashing out in grief, but it doesn’t make her words any less hurtful. Cassian’s back is stiff, and even a cursory glance at him shows how much Jyn has wounded him. But Bodhi is unused to offering comfort, as if those capabilities have grown creaky and rusted over after years of disuse, so the best he can do is rest his hand on Cassian’s shoulder for a moment, nodding when Cassian looks up at him.

There are no words Bodhi can think of to make this situation okay. Nothing that Cassian doesn't already know from too much experience. He thinks back to Cassian’s unmarked wrist: a whole story written on his captain’s skin, without using a single letter.

Sometimes there just aren't any words.

They remain like this, quiet and pensive as they glide through the dark back home.

Their stolen ship arrives at Yavin 4 to a cloud of movement and concern. The group is pulled apart in different directions as Jyn is hurried off to the council, Cassian sent off to report back on their mission, and the rest of them left behind to wait. Bodhi secures a spot by Jyn’s side as she's being marched away, waving temporary goodbye to Baze, who parks himself with Chirrut somewhat out of the way.

He scurries into the meeting with her, determined to help her make her case, but there's no room for his voice amongst the clamoring from every other incensed council member, even as they cast aspersions on Galen, on Jyn, on Bodhi himself. He wants to defend himself, tell them he's no longer an Imperial pilot, that he's willing to bleed for the Alliance like everyone else in the room, but the argument races on, and there's nothing he can do but clutch at the hems of his vest and grit his teeth. Jyn tries, using what she's learned from Cassian to attempt to sway the crowd, but the risks are too great. Fear is too strong.

Bodhi expects to feel defeated as he departs the room in disappointment alongside Jyn, but instead there's a boiling in his gut and rising heat in his veins. He needs more than ever to take the fight to the Empire. A glance at Jyn shows she’s even more iron-willed than before, unwilling to go down easy, and with Cassian’s reappearance, so, it appears, is everyone else in their little ragtag group. A fragile truce in favor of the greater good has settled around Cassian and Jyn, so Bodhi pitches in his approval for their not-even-a-quarter-baked plan, and they all jump into action.

They make their hasty preparations with the short window of time they have, and suddenly the future seems to be bearing down on him sooner than before, everything snowballing forward until Bodhi’s sitting at the helm of his stolen Imperial shuttle full of runaway rebels, with someone scolding him over the radio and Jyn’s glare burning a hole through him as she hisses that they need to go. Oddly, his nerves choose this moment to seize. He can hear his heart pounding and the sounds of Chirrut saying something below to Melshi, and the telltale hum of the Zeta’s heating system acting up under his feet – and with an unfolding clarity, the sharp taste of death returns to his tongue.

He flounders for a name, anything to say that can end the call and get them in the air, and those words, always lingering on the surface of his memory, are forming before his brain can catch up. 

“Rogue...Rogue One,” he says, and it’s right, it must be. Everything has been leading here, to this moment. He was always meant to fly this ship. Always meant to name it.

They take to the air before any further questions can follow, and then there’s nothing but Bodhi and the stars.

Jyn retreats down to the cargo deck to discuss plans with the others, leaving Bodhi and K-2 to take them out of orbit. It’s blessedly silent as Bodhi steers them with practiced ease, even while every part of him churns with the knowledge that the end is upon him. Below, Yavin 4 grows small and faint, and it shouldn’t hurt, not as much as watching Jedha crumble, not when it was never _Bodhi’s_ home, but maybe it aches more because it could have been.

Bodhi could have lived as a rebellion pilot. He could have made something of his life. Now there’s nothing waiting for him but a lonely and painful death, and he's stricken with an incomprehensible emptiness at the thought. He's going to die and leave nothing and no one behind; gone with the remains of Jedha was everyone he ever loved and everyone who ever loved him. All his years alive will amount to nothing more than just another casualty, one more tally mark in the endless lists of those lost to the Empire. 

He makes a choked noise when he tries to swallow back down his defeat as it surges up into his chest. His sight shrinks as the impenetrable dark of space creeps in through the glass, and his breathing hitches, threatening to grow thin and agitated, when Cassian’s voice mentioning his name reaches him from the lower deck and snaps him back to reality. Slowly, the sounds of the shuttle become distinct again, and his vision unblurs as the world around him comes back into focus. The first breath he takes is the hardest: a shuddering wreck on the inhale and a weak pulse of air back out. But each following breath is easier, and he concentrates on the pull of air in and out until his body stops trembling. He needs to be calm. He needs to be his best for what’s to come.

He isn't alone. Everyone on this ship is fighting alongside him, and almost all of them, he's sure, have marks leading to the same destination as Bodhi’s. There’s no room for cynicism now. What they’re about to do is of overwhelming importance, and Bodhi is inextricably a part of it.

Bodhi’s still going to die, but he’s going to die for the rebellion. He’s going to make his fate his own.

His breathing is under control again, but he needs to take a minute to blink the dryness out of his eyes and loosen his shoulders. K-2SO, muted until now, turns his glowing gaze to Bodhi.

“Are you frightened, Bodhi Rook?” he asks in his flatly curious way.

“Yes,” Bodhi answers without a second thought. “I’m terrified, K, but I’m also so far past terrified that I’m almost okay again.”

K-2 makes a sort of nod, telling him with as much reassurance as a droid can offer, “I understand if you are frightened. Our chance of failure is over 71%.”

Bodhi releases a hysterical burst of a laugh. “Thank you. That’s very comforting.”

“But it is also under 100%. Do not give up, Bodhi.”

And the numbers are still awful, but it’s weirdly soothing. So much around him seems to have been predetermined that he forgets to account for the chances they do have. “Alright, K. I won’t,” Bodhi promises.

They fly on, passing the edge of Yavin’s pull, until the clang of boots announces Jyn’s appearance back in the cockpit. She strides over, asking for an ETA.

“We can jump to hyperspace soon,” Bodhi tells her after checking all his controls. The faulty heater is starting to get to him, so he reties his hair and pulls up his heavy sleeves to relieve some of the warmth. Jyn places her hand up, shielding her eyes from Bodhi’s wrist when he rolls his sleeves, but he shrugs and leaves his skin bare after tugging his band off as well.

He's going to die on Scarif. Might as well embrace it.

“It’s okay,” he tells her, voice still unfortunately shakier than he’d like. “I think I’m coming to peace with it. I’m not under any delusions that we live to fly another mission.” He wants to sound brave, but it comes out more hopeless than anything.

“Rogue One,” Jyn murmurs as she reads. “Our callsign. Is this why…?”

Bodhi shrugs again, keeping his hands tight around the control wheel. “It felt right. Like I’d been waiting all these years with those words on my wrist for today, for this moment. It’s finally here. I suppose I’m just glad it’ll be in service of the rebellion.”

“You can survive,” she says sharply. “It doesn’t have to end on Scarif.” Her expression is hard and glittering, filled with a fierce anger at him for accepting what he doesn’t know with certainty to be true yet, but he shakes his head, smiling wanly.

“No, I think it does. But I’m not...I don’t think I’m ready, not yet, but I’m learning not to be worried, you know? It’ll all work out. The Force is with us, right?” If he says it enough, like Chirrut does, it will come true. _I fear nothing, for all is as the Force wills it_ , he recites in his head.

Jyn doesn’t answer. K-2 turns his head, as if to pretend he isn’t listening in on their conversation, and she crouches down to adjust her boots, wrenching at the leather with a rough tug before rising up to lean against the wall sullenly. She glances between Bodhi’s arm and her own, and slowly, her anger trickles away into grief. Bodhi feels his stomach clench as he scrambles for something reassuring to say, but everything shrivels in his throat before it can escape his mouth. While he struggles, Jyn presses a hand to her eyes and says something Bodhi doesn't expect.

“‘Your father would have been proud of you, Jyn.’ That’s what mine say. Funny, isn’t it? Thought for a long time I would never die, because who the hell would possibly have reason to say that to me?”

Bodhi blinks rapidly, digesting what it would have meant for Jyn to grow up with those words gracing her skin after being ripped from her family by circumstance all those years ago. The girl with no parents and no home, and a heart grown too callous to understand how to let others in again. Galen’s stardust, drifting through life trying to figure out how she could possibly make him proud when he’s lightyears and galaxies out of reach.

“He would,” Bodhi says, pressing the immovable truth into every word. “He would be proud of you.”

Jyn’s laugh is short and bitter, directed at herself. “I'm not so sure. Cassian was right. I had the chance to leave the rebellion behind and I took it without ever looking back.” She twists her blaster in her hands, staring at Bodhi’s mark for a moment before meeting his eyes again. “I was so sick of others not watching out for me, nobody caring about what happened to me, that I became the exact same way. I cut myself off. I stopped looking out for anyone but myself. But how many have died because I wasn’t out here, fighting with the Alliance? How many more could I have helped to save?”

Her eyes are bright, shining with the emotion she usually tries to keep contained under her stoic manner, and Bodhi sees his own desperate need for atonement reflected in them. Gently, he places his hand at her elbow, squeezing just to prove to her that he's here, and that he understands.

“I don’t know, but you’ve changed, Jyn, and that’s what matters most. What you’re doing now – it’s going to help save millions of innocent people. Sometimes people like us get second chances, and I think it says a lot that you’re taking your chance head-on. We’re going to get those plans. We're going to help the Alliance win.”

Bodhi’s no good at giving speeches, and even though he's hoping against hope that his promises will mystically come true, he's not sure that his words don't fall flat. But Jyn nods minutely, and releases a harsh breath before standing straight, a newly lit fire in her eyes. 

She gives him a not-quite-smile, the corners of her mouth lifting just slightly, and Bodhi imagines the lingering echoes of the round-eyed, ruddy-cheeked little girl that Galen had told him about in a rare moment of soft sentimentality. “He'd be proud of you too, Bodhi,” Jyn says, and his heart creaks under the pressure of this kindness. “We wouldn't be here if it weren't for you. Thank you.”

“I'm just...doing what I can to make things right,” he mutters back as his fingers twitch against the wheel. Ahead, space stretches on, cold and empty and familiar.

“Right, I understand.”

Jyn excuses herself; Bodhi twists around in his chair long enough to see her ask for Cassian for their overdue talk as she descends the ladder. K-2 has turned as well, but he makes no comment besides an oddly meaningful humph.

Things quiet down again as Bodhi brings them farther out, preparing for hyperspace. K-2SO leaves him for a short time at Cassian’s request, leaving Bodhi alone for the first time in several days. The solitude isn’t bad when he gives himself conscious reminders that there's a whole team on board with him, but Bodhi’s chest does feel less tight when Baze trudges over, dropping into K-2’s vacated seat and settling in like a large roosting bird. No matter the circumstance, Baze seems to carry himself with a steady gait and clear eyes, unfazed and mildly exasperated by everything falling apart around him. Bodhi imagines his emotions only get out of hand when Chirrut gets involved, though, knowing Chirrut, he's _always_ involved, meaning it must take a lot of concentration (or meditation, perhaps) for Baze to keep his wits.

“You’re the new co-pilot, then?” Bodhi asks Baze with a sideways glance. “Maybe you’ll be a better conversationalist than the last one,” he continues in Jedhanese, taking satisfaction in the way Baze’s mouth quirks upward. 

“Do not expect too much.”

“I’ll try to contain myself.”

After a stretch of comfortable silence, Baze sits forward in his chair, reading Bodhi’s wrist with a neutral expression on his face.

“You’ve changed your stance. Decided not to hide them any longer?”

At this point, Bodhi can’t see the use of pretending he doesn’t know what his final mark says. A tremor of fear ripples through his skin, from his feet to his fingertips, but he forces himself to take a deep-reaching breath. It’s going to be okay, he repeats to himself. “Don’t tell Chirrut, but maybe I came around to his way of thinking,” Bodhi admits, rubbing at his words with a thumb. 

Baze rewards him with an actual laugh: gruff and warm and obviously rare. “It’s too late. He has already heard you.” He kicks his legs out, settling back again, and Bodhi laughs faintly before making a confession for his own sake.

“I don’t think I’ve got quite the same strength of faith that Chirrut does, but I was hoping- I thought that maybe looking at the words would make them easier to accept. Maybe I could finally be brave. I wanted to stop living in fear, if even only for my last day.”

“That is admirable,” Baze tells him, which does help assuage some of the jittering in Bodhi’s nerves, until he continues. “But sometimes, there are reasons to be afraid. Reasons to keep your words hidden.”

With this ominous decree, he sits forward once more, scrutinizing Bodhi while he yanks off the glove on his right hand. Bodhi watches warily as he yanks up the baggy sleeve of his suit, baring the pale blue lettering on his wrist. Despite the long, ragged scar bisecting the mark, Bodhi can still read it clearly.

_Look for the Force, and you will always find me._

There’s no doubt in his mind over what this means. “Chirrut?” he asks softly, and the sound Baze makes, part-sigh, part-laugh, and part-groan, all accompanied by a dry smile, seems to perfectly encompass their relationship. Bodhi’s spent enough time in their company, as brief as it has been, to know that what they share is the most enduring of loves. The kind stopped only by death, and even then, Bodhi would sooner bet against death than them.

Which means in return, the prayer curled around Chirrut’s arm, the prayer that sends him off from this world, can only be spoken by Baze. Nothing else would make sense. The same tender hollowness insinuates itself between Bodhi’s ribs, settling over his lungs. How painful it must be, to know you will watch your beloved die.

“Who else?” Baze says, rolling his sleeve back down.

Who else, indeed. Who else would Baze follow to the ends of the known universe and beyond? Who else would Baze follow into death?

“How long have you known?” Bodhi asks. How long have you been carrying the weight of knowing, is what goes unsaid.

“Long enough. He was always going to be the death of me. At least I can know that his voice will be the last thing I hear.”

Baze’s tone doesn't betray any hint of regret.

While he readjusts the fit of his glove, Baze stands as Bodhi prepares for them to jump. Slowly he rises, and makes to leave and rejoin his partner. But he stops by Bodhi’s side, choosing his parting words with care. “You have had many reasons to be afraid,” he tells Bodhi solemnly. “But you chose to make the hard choices, the right choices, regardless. No matter what happens on Scarif, you should know that you are already brave, my friend.”

He claps Bodhi on the back as he leaves, and Bodhi contemplates the almost familial gesture with the warmth of gratitude surrounding him. In the span of these last few days, he’s grown altogether too attached to these people. These strangers who have come barreling unannounced into his life (or, maybe he had thrown himself into theirs). If things had been different...well, there’s no use daydreaming about all the possible lives he could have lived, so he pushes it out of his mind.

Shortly after Baze departs, Jyn and K-2 return for their jump to hyperspace, and then Scarif is there, green and blue and uninviting under its shield gate. Maybe the Force is taking pity on them, because their arrival in enemy territory runs as smooth as a dream, and Bodhi feels the dreaded weight of being grounded again as he lands the shuttle.

Every moment after that hinges on fortune and a prayer from heartbeat to heartbeat. Their plan is barely a plan at all. They're running on nothing but faith and desperation, but maybe it'll be enough. The team splits, and with them goes Bodhi’s balance. He’s afraid for them, and afraid for the Alliance and every life the Empire wants to extinguish, but his role is here, waiting on the ship for a quick extraction.

His heart is already thundering at an unnatural speed while he’s crouched in the cargo hold with his remaining comrades when Cassian radios in, telling him their change in plans. He knows even before their conversation ends that he’s going to have to step out into danger, but even in his terror he finds a sense of acceptance. It’s only right, when the rest of Rogue One is risking their lives. He explains to the others about the comm tower, and what needs to be done, then straps the cable on. With a deeply unsteady breath, he plunges out of the hold.

Bodhi wouldn’t be sure if he were breathing at all as he jogs toward the tower, but for the sound of his panting gasps. Even so, his lungs lose all air when the cable catches before he can reach the shuttle. He gets to untangling as fast as he can, but the whole beach is flooded with stormtroopers, and of course one catches him before he can finish.

“Hey, you. Identify yourself.”

And he’s almost tempted to laugh, because there are guns pointed at him, but those aren’t his words. He’s going to die, but not right here, not at the hands of these troopers. With all the calmness of certainty, he stands.

“I can explain-” he begins to bluff, but a blast takes out the trooper and he manages to duck behind a crate as his captors return fire. He’s not dead, but he’s more than rattled, and when Cassian calls again, the helplessness he feels at being pinned down only yards away from his goal can’t be contained. But Cassian presses him on desperately, and he knows he has to make a run for it. He’s got to succeed.

He isn’t going to fall here. It’s not time yet.

So he squinches his eyes shut, mentally shrieks one of Chirrut’s benedictions ( _I fear nothing, for all is as the Force wills it_ ), and runs, ducking up and down in an ineffective but instinctive attempt to protect himself from blaster shots. It’s not graceful or impressive, but it works, and he gets the cable plugged in. From there, it’s a waiting game. He needs someone on the other end to pull the main switch. Melshi answers, but his voice is pained, and after their radio call ends, Bodhi can do nothing but wait nervously, counting each second as he stares down his comm screen.

There isn’t a moment to blink, but his mind wanders to the others, and he wonders distantly which of them, if any, are still alive. Jyn and Cassian must be, but he’s heard no word on K-2. Droids cannot die, he reminds himself, but it is of no comfort. 

And Baze and Chirrut. They’re going to die together, this he knows with bittersweet inevitability. He thinks it’s the way they would want it, but it’s brutally unfair of the Force, to allow two people so beloved to one another no time to grieve their losses. But perhaps that’s a kindness in itself, to know that the person you love doesn’t have to learn to live without you.

As the strain on his vision starts to become unbearable, finally the console screen flickers on with orange light, and he lets out an exclamation of joy. They’re online. The plan is going to work.

Bodhi doesn’t even stop to think. He gets hooked in as quickly as physically possible, sending his message out into the airwaves. “This is Rogue One, calling any Alliance ships that can hear me!” He gives barely a pause to wait for a response, his mind flooded with anxiety over the possibility of receiving no answer. After he hears nothing but his breath and stuttering heartbeat, he throws his goggles in agitation, and tries again. “Is there anybody up there? This is Rogue One! Come in, over.”

This time, the response is instantaneous.

“This is Admiral Raddus, Rogue One, we hear you!” comes the crackling answer, and Bodhi thinks the rush of elation that seizes him might be the happiest he’s been in the last decade.

Mouth moving faster than the words can go, he manages to convey to the admiral their plan, and what still needs to be accomplished in order to transmit the data. For a few excruciating seconds, there’s nothing but radio silence from the other end, and even though Bodhi knows the admiral must be giving orders, or formulating some sort of attack strategy, he can’t help counting the milliseconds until his voice returns.

Outside the ship, the battle continues, felling both troopers and rebels, and Bodhi makes a desperate, silent plea to the Force that enough of them are still alive to hold the line until the transmission can be completed. He sends an extra prayer for Jyn and Cassian, who must be fighting their way through the heart of danger. May the Force be with them.

Finally, the admiral returns, telling Bodhi with confidence, “Standby, Rogue One, we're on it.”

Bodhi can feel the tension release from his shoulders at this reassurance. “This is for you, Galen,” he says before he can fully register the admiral’s words, too relieved at completing his mission and completing his friend’s vision to notice.

And when he does, everything falls away except the sound of a trooper’s grenade bouncing off the shuttle wall.

Time slows, growing long and dolorous in his final moments, but all Bodhi can think of is Cassian, who makes his own fate, and Jyn, who finally found her way back home. He knows they're still alive. They must be transmitting the plans at this very moment. They're going to succeed; he knows this, like he knows the stars – with absolute certainty. There's no longer any reason to be afraid.

With his heart finally unburdened, Bodhi waits.

One final time, he repeats his prayer.

_I am one with the Force, and the Force is with me. And I fear nothing, for all is as the Force wills it._

Bodhi’s world fills with light.


End file.
